9:51 PM,
Aug. 31, 2013

KiOR's $213 million facility in Columbus has a workforce of 100 full-time and contract employees.

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Nearly a year after starting operations in Columbus, advanced-biofuels company KiOR continues to lose millions of dollars each financial quarter, and its plant in the northeast Mississippi city is running at less than half of capacity.

But its chief executive says the company is slowly steadying itself and is poised to finally realize its goal of converting wood chips into environmentally friendly, cellulosic fuel that he says will lower greenhouse-gas emissions and prove cheaper than standard gasoline.

KiOR, based in Pasadena, Texas, made the first shipments of its fuel to ...